A coil insertion tool which inserts pre-wound electrical conductor coils into a stator of an electric machine is provided with several elements. The stator has spaced-apart teeth which form coil receiving slots therebetween. Among the most important elements of the coil insertion tool are elongate guide members which are arranged in annular relationship and which guide the coils into the slots of the stator. Customarily there is one coil guide member for each of the teeth of the stator, as each coil guide member is in juxtaposition with one of the teeth of the stator. In the past, such coil guide members are made entirely of rigid metallic material. Such coil guide members are shown in U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,324,536 and 3,559,268.
Such prior art coil guide members have lips or projections which partially cover the sides of the teeth with which they are in contact. The lips must be as thin as practicable in order to provide maximum space between adjacent teeth for coil insertion. However, by necessity the lips of prior art coil guide members have a significant thickness dimension. Therefore, the thickness of the lips or projections of prior art coil guide members is sometimes a limiting factor in regard to the wire size of coils which can be inserted into a given stator. Such prior art coil guide members have other numerous objectionable features and limitations. For example, so far as is known, all prior art coil guide members have rigid lip portions which are subject to wear. When such wear occurs, the coil guide members cannot function properly. Therefore, prior art coil guide members must be discarded. Such coil guide members are relatively costly to produce, and discarding thereof results in significant loss.
Also, such prior art coil guide members being of rigid metal, sometimes cause scratching of the insulation material of the coils as they are inserted into a stator.
It is therefore an object of this invention to provide a coil guide member for a coil insertion tool which inserts pre-wound electric conductor coils into a stator, in which the coil guide member includes lip portions which may be flexible or rigid and which are readily replaceable when wear thereof occurs. Thus, the entire coil guide member does not need to be discarded when wear occurs.
It is another object of this invention to provide a coil guide member which has lip portions which are thinner than those of prior art devices. Therefore, the usable slot gap for wire insertion is greater. Thus, insertion of a larger range of coil wire sizes is possible by use of the structure of this invention.
It is another object of this invention to provide a coil guide member having flexible lip portions which permit greater tolerance in lamination teeth alignment than is possible in prior art coil guide members.
It is another object of this invention to provide such a coil guide member which permits machine insertion of pre-wound electrical coils into a stator of an electrical machine.
It is another object of this invention to provide such a coil guide member which includes flexible elements which permit ease of insertion of pre-wound electrical coils having any one of a large range of wire diameters.
It is another object of this invention to provide such a coil guide member which does not scratch wire insulation as pre-wound coils are guided into stator slots.
Other objects and advantages of this invention reside in the construction of parts, the combination thereof, the method of production and the mode of operation, as will become more apparent from the following description.